Armed group seeks legitimacy with Tripoli migrant deal
ROME/TUNIS: A powerful armed group, known for smuggling people from Libya, is seeking legitimacy and state security jobs from the Tripoli government in exchange for stopping migrant boats from leaving the coast of Sabratha for Italy, a senior group member said.
The group, the Anas Al-Dabbashi brigade, struck a deal with Libya’s UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) this summer to clamp down on trafficking, the senior brigade member, who gave his name as Mohamed, told Reuters.
The need for the GNA to strike such a deal would illustrate the power of armed groups in western Libya, which continue to hold the real influence locally as they have since a 2011 uprising that ousted Muammar Qaddafi.
The revelation would also throw light on the fragility of the sharp recent reduction in migrant arrivals from Italy, which took over from the Aegean route as the main focus of European concerns in the crisis.
The GNA did not respond to requests for comment.
Local sources, who declined to be named, said there had been at least one meeting between government officials and Ahmed Al-Dabbashi, identified as one of the main “facilitators” of human smuggling in Libya in a UN report earlier this year.
Mohamed said there had been a number of such meetings, and that the brigade was also offered the possibility of an amnesty for past smuggling activity.
To show it could uphold the deal with Tripoli, the several-hundredstrong brigade has cracked down on departures with the help of the coast guard leading to an 80 percent fall in the arrival of rescued migrants in Italy last month, Mohamed said.
With a national election looming in the first half of next year, the government in Rome, which welcomed the sudden decline shown in official data, is under pressure to show it can stop, or at least slow, migration from the oilproducing desert state.
Libya remains split between rival political camps and armed alliances. The GNA has struggled to impose its authority on Tripoli and other parts of western Libya, and has been rejected by factions that control the east of the country.
Like normal police Mohamed said the GNA, under pressure from Italy to halt the migrant flows, had exerted pressure on the Al-Dabbashi brigade. The GNA “said that they would gather all the cities west of Tripoli against us, and they would come and fight us.”
“On the other hand, they have offered to let us join the police, and let us join the military,” Mohamed said. “If this plan goes forward and the (Tripoli) government was telling the truth... in six months time everybody in this battalion will be like normal police.”
A second source in Sabratha spoke to Ahmed Al-Dabbashi, who confirmed that Mohamed was a member of the brigade. It is the first time a brigade member has spoken at length about why the group suddenly shifted from smuggling to policing, a change first reported by Reuters last month.
Some international media reported that Al-Dabbashi had received €5 million directly from Italy’s secret services to stop the migrant boats, but Mohamed denied this. Italy has also denied any direct payments to armed groups.
The fragility of the security situation in Sabratha was underscored by territorial clashes that erupted there over the weekend, with Al-Dabbashi’s group battling cross-town rivals in some of the heaviest fighting the city has seen in recent years.
Explosions could be heard as far away as the port of Zawiya, 22 km away.
Both sides in the fighting claim to have the backing of the Tripoli government, and both battled together to drive Daesh out of the area last year.